Sunday, 30 November 2014

Telling Them About You-Know-What

I'm going for chatty here.

The last actual serious NaNoWriMo 2014 write-in happened today. Since I finished on 24th, I used it to go through the draft and start tweaking and in fact there are bits missing, but the majority is there. I need to track the teapot and make sure it doesn't replicate, add a couple of bits of story to glue it together and probably also a few appendices, which people think is weird. I should probably then expose it to critical eyes. My most successful ever story, which I shall refer to as Amanda TBG here and henceforth, was so exposed and that's probably one reason people like it so much.

Speaking of Amanda TBG, and yes that was where my name came from, I'm currently engaged in writing my "autobiography" for the Nottingham clinic. I am really quite nervous about this whole process. The connection is that the subject of Amanda TBG is what I used to refer to as my Problem back when I was a teen, and this is where I get into major difficulties. Firstly, I can't refer to it directly here and of course it is sexual, a paraphilia in fact, but it is neither transvestic fetishism nor autogynephilia. For the uninitiated, transvestic fetishism is getting turned on by wearing "women's" clothes, a category which of course I reject. Incidentally, that tiny handful of people who know the whole "Problem" will realise the irony of me being accused of this, but we're talking inner circle knowledge here.

Look, I am now going to cut the crud and stop playing games. The situation is this. I have had two very unusual sexual kinks. One of them is more widely known to friends, is really bizarre and if I didn't have a sense of humour about it I would probably have tied weights to my bits and thrown them off a bridge quite some time ago. It's completely harmless to everyone else but if I indulged in it properly, it would definitely kill me, so I don't. I can guarantee that whatever you think it is, you're wrong unless I've actually told you. The trouble is this: it is in my opinion supremely relevant to my gender identity issues and could make or break my case for diagnosis and so forth, but of course as well as making it, it could break it, for this reason: people are sometimes seen as autogynephilic or transvestically fetishistic and presumably refused help for that reason, although why is another question because so what if it is a fetish? What that would mean is that a load of transwomen were wandering around enjoying themselves sexually and not being a problem to anyone else because they did things like stay at home all day and play with their boobs instead, so who cares? That sounds not only like a good thing to me, but something which radfems would actually want: "men" who are not rapists. Sounds like a public service to me. Anyway, it's not the case for me, but this paraphilia might be understood in that way, for two reasons. Firstly, it's a transformation paraphilia. Secondly, it resembles something distinctly female. People who know about it always make the connection with my gender issue, and they also see it as distinctly feminine. Also, when I write about it, my text reads like it was written by a woman, whereas this blog entry definitely reads like it was written by a man according to the Gender Genie. Therefore, it's a really high stakes strategy to go in there with all guns blazing and say "I find X a turn on" - they would either be completely convinced by it or completely convinced of the opposite. Of course, it could be that the opposite is what I really need, but it really doesn't seem that way. To me right now, thinking of myself as male feels identical to feeling low self-esteem and thinking of myself as female feels the same as raising my self-esteem, and it really doesn't seem sexual.

The other kink is so rare I can't even find it on the internet. I seem to be genuinely the only person in the world with it, and even I haven't got it any more because the gloop made it go away, which considering the first observation is probably just as well. Nonetheless, after drawing my counsellor a certain diagram, it became clear what it was about and it is also to some extent evidence in favour of a pretty deep problem with gender. It is also deliciously, phenomenally, hugely ironic in a way that makes me want to shout it from the rooftops, but it "should not be told abroad" and I'm not about to share it with anyone. The three people who know about it and what I've done appreciate the intense irony of my situation and I'll have to be content with that. Ah well.

This is what I think happens. Your brain develops structurally as one sex in the body which is structurally of another. Consequently, rather unsurprisingly, when it starts to develop what's supposed to be the common sexuality for its own brain sex, it's doing it in a hormonal environment which is supposed to be doing it for a different brain sex. Therefore, rather unsurprisingly, it gets more than a bit confused. The result of this is that a gender dysphoric person's sexuality will be unusual, and this then gets confused with that unusual sexuality including transvestic fetishism or autogynephilia. It is an understandable confusion by observers, but it isn't usually what happens and even when it is, it doesn't mean sexual desire is the main motive for wanting the organs which manifest that desire to be heavily modified.

So maybe I will go in there and mention it, or maybe I won't. What do you think, oh vast audience?